Mini Turducken Recipe
Turducken is a meat creation made famous in Louisiana and it involves stuffing a whole deboned turkey with a deboned chicken stuffed with a deboned duck. If you’ve never been to Louisiana, chances are you’ve never heard of turducken but here in the south you just might see it on the Thanksgiving table.
I decided to make a mini Turducken by using just the breast of these birds and it turned out way better than I envisioned.
First, for this mini turducken recipe, I had to source the 3 birds. I found the chicken and duck breasts at my local Kroger but didn’t have any luck locating boneless, skinless turkey breast. I went ahead and bought a whole bone-in turkey breast and cut each side off the bone and removed the skin. Butterfly each breast so they’ll lay flat.
In between each layer of meat this mini turducken has a layer of sausage or other type stuffing. I’m using a spicy pork sausage mixed with sautéed onion and mushroom for 1 layer, and a crawfish boudin sausage removed from the casing for the other. Use your imagination here; I’ve seen some pretty creative and tasty ideas that really give the turducken flavor.
To assemble the mini Turducken, stretch out plastic wrap over a cutting board and place the turkey breast down first. Spoon the spicy sausage mixture on the turkey and place the chicken breast down next. Top it with the crawfish boudin and finally the duck breast.
Bring the edges of the turkey up and around and wrap the whole thing tight with plastic wrap. Notice I didn’t season anything at all. The spicy sausage and boudin have a plenty of flavor and the whole thing is going to get wrapped in bacon….Yeah I said Bacon!
Rest the mini turducken in the refrigerator for a couple hours to help them form into a roast shape. (It would be ok to go overnight if needed).
To cook the turducken fire up your smoker. I used my Big Green Egg with the plate setter for indirect heat. Add some wood to the hot coals for smoke; I went with cherry for a lighter flavor. Bring the cooker to 275-300⁰ and let it stabilize.
Stretch out a sheet of butcher paper over your work surface and build a 9×9 strip bacon weave. Unwrap each turducken and place turkey side down (duck side up). Bring the bacon weave up and around the turducken and fold or trim the end pieces.
Place each on a greased wire rack (my chicken racks work great) and place on the Big Green Egg.
It’ll take a couple of hours to smoke these mini turduckens. After an hour, go ahead and insert a probe thermometer into the center to monitor internal temperature. I like to use the Thermoworks DOT – it’s works great.
Turducken needs to cook to a minimum of 165⁰, so just keep a watchful eye on the temp and if the bacon gets too dark lay a piece of foil over it to stop the browning.

When the alarm sounds, remove each turducken from the grill and rest for 15-20 minutes before slicing.
These mini turduckens turned out incredibly tender and juicy. The sausages gave the breasts a spicy but not hot flavor, and you know the bacon just made it better.
You can really get adventurous with this recipe to make it your creation. If you’re looking for a different idea on what to cook for the Holidays, give this recipe a try.
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Mini Turducken Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 Turkey Breast (boneless, skinless)
- 2 Chicken Breast (boneless, skinless)
- 2 Duck Breast (boneless, skinless)
- 2lb Thin sliced bacon
- ½ lb Spicy Pork Sausage
- ½ lb Crawfish Boudin Sausage removed from casings.
- 6oz diced mushrooms
- ½ onion diced
- ½ cup Bread Crumbs
- 1 TBS Olive Oil
Instructions
- In a sauté pan over medium heat add olive oil and onion. Cook for 2-3 minutes until onion turn translucent. Add mushrooms and continue to cook for 2 minutes. Remove from pan and set aside.
- Place spicy sausage in sauté pan and brown. Add onion/mushroom mixture and strain excess fat. Place in a bowl and stir in bread crumbs to combine.
- Cover a cutting board with plastic wrap and place turkey breast on top. Layer with 2 tablespoons of sausage mixture followed by a chicken breast. Layer with 2 Tablespoons of boudin sausage and top with duck breast.
- Fold the edges of the turkey breast around and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Store in refrigerator for 2 hours up to overnight.
- Preheat Big Green Egg or other grill/smoker for indirect cooking at 275-300⁰ add cherry wood chunks to hot coals for light smoke.
- Lay out a sheet of wax or butcher paper on the work surface and build 9×9 strip bacon weave.
- Unwrap each mini turducken and place on bacon weave turkey side down. Wrap bacon around turducken and fold edges. Place on greased wire cooking rack.
- Place each turducken on the smoker and cook until internal temperature reaches 165⁰ on instant read thermometer. Rest each for 15 minutes and slice into desired pieces.
Malcom Reed
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